


live life, stay free

by orphan_account



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! Zexal
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, F/M, Humor, Implied Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-07
Updated: 2015-01-07
Packaged: 2018-03-06 11:40:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,253
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3133073
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Date me." "<i>What</i>?"</p><p>Rio loses a bet. This is something like a tiebreaker.</p>
            </blockquote>





	live life, stay free

It starts when she loses a bet.

It's all Ryoga's fault, too; sometime around 10, Vector's like, "Bet Nasch kisses Yuma three times by midnight," and she's the faithless, "He'll only be drunk enough after the New Year," and Vector furrows his brow, smirking, so she nods, _game on_ , and they shake on it. She's confident because Ryoga's her brother and an idiot and three just sounds like too many too early, but either way it's not like Vector is torture to make out with when he cashes in the vaguely established "favors" they bet for—Rio kind of indulges herself when it comes to them—so in the off chance that she does lose, it won't be that bad.

They spend the rest of the party tailing the couple with their phones out to document the evidence, and by 11:20 Ryoga is drunk, pathetic, and armed with mistletoe.

11:21 nets him his first kiss.

Vector snaps one, two, and three pics even though she's right there when it happens; grins at her, showing his blindingly white teeth; and sings, in his spurious tenor, "Guess this one's miiiine, Merag!"

She pushes his face away and rolls her eyes, swearing internally at Ryoga for wounding her pride. "Yeah, yeah, whatever. See you when the ball drops."

"Hmmmm? What for?"

"Vector," she says, because there're times when his innocent act is tolerable and even times when he's actually pretty hilarious to be around, but then there is two seconds after those times, when it all disintegrates into him being an insufferable asshole.

"Doncha wanna hear what I want for my favor?"

Vector _always_ asks for a kiss. The first time he cashed for that she made a face and downright refused and he pouted and whined about how she _promised_ , he could ask for _anything_ , but eventually he settled for her doing his calc. The second time he asked a few bets later, she was in a better mood and maybe a little tipsy so, _you know what, fine_ , and after that it really just became a matter of having an excuse.

Presently she suggests, "A kick in the groin?"

"Nooo."

"Me to leak your prom pics?"

"I was adorable," he insists, although she can attest otherwise.

"Then what do you want," she deadpans, and he says without missing a beat, "Date me."

What.

"What."

"What?" he asks, the purest of probity on his unfortunately attractive face.

She backs up, eyes scrunched and brow creased, "Oh my _god_ do you actually _like_ me?" and he mimics the face and put his arms up and goes, "UHHH NO have you _met_ you? I just thought it'd be fun," to which she blinks at him and repeats, carefully, like he might not know the meaning of the word he used, "Fun."

"To watch you squirm," he tacks on.

Okay. Yeah. Sure.

But his face is challenging, so she does what's natural and punches the smirk right off—this time by snatching him by his stupid shirt collar, pinning him up because he's like an entire head shorter than her, and kissing him senseless.

"Watch me," she says when she's done and he's just getting started, and she drops him like a ragdoll. He squeaks. She snorts.

* * *

The first order of business comes soon after, when he smugly changes his Facebook status at three in the morning to _In a relationship with Rio Kamishiro_ , signs into her account to make her accept it, and therefore has it show up on her entire extended network's feed before the work day.

Reactions vary. Her mom, miles away from Heartland City, is full of exclamation points and loudly proclaims that her boyfriend is attractive (presumably going off his profile picture, which comes from a shoot Vector did with Alit sometime last month and makes him look taller than he is). She gushes about how one of her children is _finally_ in a relationship, that her hopes at grandchildren are no longer completely dead, and how he and Rio have to Skype her ASAP.

Rio's high school friends comment with a variety of emoji, from hands-up to shock to exclamation points, because _Rio Kamishiro_ with a boyfriend, where did _that_ come from? Yuma expresses his surprise at the odd match but offers his congrats; Alit is so caught off-guard he uses the Barian eBoard account to respond. Tetsuo Takeda posts vague Taylor Swift lyrics all day. Her brother replies once at 4AM with "?", once at 4:03AM with "?????", and twice at 4:26AM with "uhhHHHhh????"

Rio didn't entertain notions of this being a secret—Vector won't let her live this down for the rest of her life if he has his way, probably—so she's mostly concerned with (a) how he has her password, and (b) how to break it to her mom that they won't be having 2.5 cute children or a dog unless the dog is Vector himself.

Unfortunately she has no time to think about either of those things, because she has a backlog of thirteen texts and seven missed calls, and she'll only give you one guess who they're all from.

Ryoga answers the phone with, "What the HELL."

"Vector hacked my account."

" _Obviously_ ," says Ryoga, who either doesn't know about their bets or chooses to pretend he doesn't (the more likely of the two). He sounds like he's at the gym, or pacing, or crying into a bowl of ice cream or something. "You never change your status. Also I'd have to disown you."

"Mhmm."

Silence, charged with awkwardness. Rio's responding to a bombardment of messages from their mom asking about the fun details— _how is second year going isn't Vector that nice boy you went to high school with_ _is your brother still going to classes—_ when Ryoga coughs on the other end of the line.

Three, two, one—

"You're not. Uh, actually dating anyone, are you?"

She gets herself a drink first. Lets him sit in suspense.

"Any of your business if I were?"

"Rio," he says, and she expects that he would have a speech if the boy in question hadn't struck him mute. She nearly drools for laughter. " _Rio_. This is serious."

"Well," she points out, "I didn't change my status back."

* * *

Vector shows up at her dorm sometime around sunset, having been summoned by a few texts that demanded to know (a) where he got her password, and (b) how exactly he thinks Rio should break to her mom not to expect any grandchildren in the near future, especially not ginger fruits of vermin.

"What?" Vector is stretched out on her couch, remarkably comfortably for someone who's never been in her building before. He's taken the liberty of scavenging the fridge for Kotori's last kiwi ramune and is playing with the ball. Now he twists toward her and pouts. "You don't want a family, Merag? Oh, oh, or should I call you Rio now that we—"

"No," she says firmly, because that is a line that will not be crossed. Nasch and Merag may just be stupid eBoard nicknames, but Vector pollutes every word he says, and Rio likes her given name untarnished, thank you.

He bursts into a fit of giggles, tosses the empty bottle into the trash, and kicks up his feet. Cashing in his favor for a month's worth of freeloading could probably have netted him the same benefits, minus the satisfaction of Ryoga's reaction to the Facebook thing—which, admittedly, probably worth it.

But damn, Vector could at least _pretend_ to try. She doesn't care for Emotional Fulfillment or whatever, but don't boyfriends typically come with flowers or chocolate or something? Where are her material gains?

She says as much and he looks at her in horror, proclaiming to the flowers, "What?! They'd _die_ the second I gave them to you! Think of their _children_!" and to the chocolate, "No way, too expensive." He pauses for a moment's contemplation and snickers darkly before adding, "Unless you're into—"

She cuts him off with "Nope" and steps on his foot.

He howls in pain and it's very satisfying.

The rest of his visit is spent doing mostly unproductive things like marathoning shitty anime and tasting her roommate's kiwi ramune and pushing Vector away at just the right moment to entirely disappoint him, netting her a, "Hooooly shit, you are _such_ a tease—"

"Not really in the mood today," she says, shrugging. "Actually, I'm kind of…" She points emphatically downstairs. "Y'know."

He squints and tilts his head, like the new angle will help him see through and understand. "I do?"

She shoves him off the sofa and says, "I'm _bleeding_ , dumbass."

He winces, rubs his butt, and stares at her. "What?"

She waits patiently—Ryoga is her brother, after all, which tends to gives a person experience with things like this—and watches in amusement when it dawns on Vector like a sunset, his color slowly fading. "Ohhhh." He pulls a face. Apparently, she's killed his drive. Good. "Gross."

"Hey, go get me some tampons?"

"What."

She smiles, kicks up her feet so there's no room for him to sit again, and says, "You're my _boyfriend_ , aren't you?"

"Never said I'd be a _good_ one."

"Never said I'd be available," she counters, and shoos him away. "Tampons. Now."

"Yeah, okay," he says, and grabs a fist full of change from the savings' jar she and Kotori keep at the door, then waves. "For you, my dear, _anything."_

He comes back five minutes later with two individually wrapped, nondescript tampons and a bonus "sanitary napkin," presses a quarter in her palm, says, "You said tampon _ **s**  _, right?" and tells her to keep the change.

Wow.

* * *

He sends her good morning and good night poops throughout the week, and on Friday evening shows up at her dorm again with flowers. They're white chrysanthemums, which is _so_ thoughtful of him, but Rio laughs because the stingy asshole must've had to buy that arrangement by the funeral home three blocks down or something, and it's cold outside and Vector doesn't have access to any viable transportation that isn't his chicken legs, so he must've walked the entire way.

She hopes his dry skin and chapped lips are painful.

"I got us reservations at Mizael's," he says, puffing his chest out. That sounds like it'll be a disaster for at least two of their number, so she gets dressed and steps outside with her purse and without her jacket.

Vector's already shivering when they're a block down. She takes it as her moment to stop walking, hold out her hand, and say, "I'm cold."

"To your very core," he says, and pulls his jacket tighter around him, stuffing his hands into the pockets and sticking his tongue out.

They keep moving.

Vector, incidentally, doesn't actually have a reservation. The wait at the fancy restaurant Mizael works at is two hours (one after Rio tracks him down and convinces him to get them a table for two). Vector spends the entire time making loud, crude comments about everyone around them. He demands the group of friends with their two babies turn their noisemakers off and give them showers while they're at it, says that the elderly couple _really_ needs to get a room, and wonders no less than six times whether the people that Rio cut are cutting _them_ in a system that's already assigned them numbers. Also, it's cold.

When they finally sit down, Vector complains that it's too hot and takes off his jacket, carefully folds it, and places it on the seat next to him in the booth. Rio kicks off her heels, snatches the jacket from under the table, and—having spent the entire time next to the door—pulls it on.

"You are _not_ wearing that when the food gets here."

"I am now."

"Merag. Vector. You two ready."

The last voice is, of course, Mizael's, tired and irritated and not even bothering to smile at his stupid org friends. If he can even call them that.

"No," says Rio, and "Nope!" exclaims Vector with glee, and Mizael groans and walks away and will come back later to the same exact thing. Vector goes through the menu at least seven times, scratches his chin and makes a big show of not knowing what he wants, and finally decides on the same exact thing as Rio—who, having expected Vector to order an actual meal from which she could steal, only asked for a drink.

"Just coffee," he says pleasantly, offering back the menu. Mizael snatches it up looking murderous. "Black. No sugar."

She spends the time waiting for the arrival of their coffee on her phone. He spends it ripping napkins and packets of sugar and playing a Linkin Park song with his plate, a knife, and a spoon.

"Can you, like. Not."

"Hmmmmm? Not what?"

The people in the booth next to them—evidently some businessmen trying to make a deal with a child prodigy or something—shoot him a nasty look. The ones from the booth behind her actually tap her on the shoulder and tell her to make him stop. She shrugs like it isn't her problem and they complain to the wait staff, who figure there'll be a truce if they usher Mizael over there with the coffee, or at least that once the coffee's there they'll drink and be done and leave.

They're wrong.

"Miza-chaaan, this coffee tastes like shit!"

"You put your lips on it, so I'm not surprised," Mizael mutters. Vector's brow rises and he meets eyes with Rio, who—narrowing her eyes—taps a finger to her own lips and meets eyes with Mizael, who quickly looks away.

Mizael suggests, "Did you try maybe putting cream and sugar in it?"

"That sounds like work," whines Vector. "This is _your_ job, do it for me."

Mizael does because Vector's being loud and people are watching them and probably praying silently, and then Vector tastes it and deems it okay but orders a steak, then looks at Rio and orders a smart-fit salad "for the lady." Rio tells Mizael to switch them around, to which Vector goes "Uhh, no? Two steaks, then," and there's a collective groan from literally everyone sitting around them (and one who is standing).

Another fifteen minutes of painful waiting commences.

"So," says Vector, "about those cute ginger grandkids—"

"Yeah, no."

"You keep thinking about it."

Their steaks arrive and it's definitely enough for double their number, especially considering that Vector has absolutely no appetite and won't touch it regardless. He cuts into the tiniest piece and immediately declares it tasteless; summons Mizael with a shout and demands it be reseasoned or he isn't paying. Mizael's biting his lower lip so hard it bleeds, but he takes both steaks with him and returns with them _over_ seasoned, who the hell is the chef around these parts, Vector is going to have a talk with him?

Upon the third try Vector's too heartbroken to even taste it and demands both steaks be boxed, he'll just give them to his roommate or something (who, incidentally, is also named Mizael).

Their bill comes out to something like $150 with added "disturbances" and a 25% tip. The manager is the one who presents it to them at Mizael's request, in case they leave or in case they harass him. Vector doesn't even look at it.

"Didn't bring my wallet," he says, shrugging.

"You could at least have the decency to pretend you forgot," she mutters, pulling out her card. She decides she's keeping his jacket.

"Me? Decent?"

* * *

Two weeks into their relationship, after she's claimed his jacket and his Vita and his collarbones, Rio sends him out to get a pregnancy test.

"What."

"You heard me."

"Do it yourself," he says, eyeing his jacket on the hook of her door. She notices, grabs it, and threatens to tear at the leather. A minute later, he's out the door.

She figures he won't be able to find one of those in a dorm bathroom for seventy-five cents. The hope is that he'll have to sacrifice his manly pride or something to ask for it at the drugstore; too late she wonders if Vector even has mortification in his emotive bank, because for all she knows he might just go into detail with the clerk or anyone else he might run into, which would really not be good and she's _actually_ on her period now, this is just a cheap laugh and _shit_ —

He comes back grinning. Tosses it to her.

"Yuma saw me. He had some questions."

Now is that Vector's loss or Yuma's or her's?

* * *

Her brother shows up an hour later and bangs at the door in a frenzy, demanding to know if she's okay and if she needs help or someone to talk to and, yes, actually, he _is_ interrupting something, but she gets dressed and gets the door. Vector follows, humming.

"EXCUSE ME I'M RIGHT HERE," Ryoga say-shouts at seeing them within five feet of each others' vicinity. "May I remind you that PDA was defined by the Heartland High guidebook as being within twelve inches of each other _thank you_."

Vector whistles and takes one step closer. Rio rolls her eyes and pushes him back.

"Can I help you?" Her brother's hair is a mess and his shirt is backwards and he's in his shrimp pajamas and frankly looks like he's had too much caffeine in the last… ten minutes?

Ryoga glares at Vector instead of speaking. Vector sticks his tongue out, shrugs, and leaps over the sofa arm for Rio's 3DS, presumably to fuck up her Fire Emblem run (a comeback for Rio restarting his emulated Nuzlocke and also probably for giving his number to her mom).

"Look," Ryoga says, finally, "I was just talking to Yuma and he said he saw"—he points at Vector—"at the store and I didn't want to hear obviously but then Yuma said they started talking and"—he points at Vector—"had something weird and—and—"

Ryoga's eyes widen, having spotted something on the table beside Vector, which could just be what Yuma was telling him about. "...Rio. What is… _that_?"

She glances behind her. "Hm? That's Vector. Glad you're catching on, Ryoga! We do in fact objectify him in this apartment."

Ryoga looks like he's going to gag. Shaking his head, he points some more at the kit. "No, the…"

"Ohh, that? Don't worry, it's not mine."

"Then…" He doesn't want to ask if it's Kotori's, because that's TMI and also a total invasion of Yuma's best friend's privacy, but he also kind of needs negative confirmation...

"It's mine," volunteers Vector, leaning into Ryoga's vision and raising his hand. At his audacity to speak Ryoga growls, stalks inside, pulls him up, pushes him out, and locks the door.

Rio's unfazed. "Vector's," she says.

"Vector."

"Yep."

"Vector, as in, like, your—" He stops, like his mouth has been petrified, like he's hysically incapable of voicing the thought. A shiver runs down his spine. He swallows, tries again, "Your—"

"Boyfriend," Rio provides helpfully.

"I don't understand," he says, looking sadly into his hands. "Mom and Dad love you."

"And I love them," she says, patting her brother on the back. She's not really sure how to explain to a guy with as vanilla a crush as Ryoga's that she and Vector are playing a game, you know? And Rio plays to win.


End file.
